From: Melanie
Hi Jessica
I have a question I hope you can help me with. When you are asking for a canter depart, a dressage instructor told me your weight, the horses bend and the lead should all be the same, so if you are asking for a right lead, then your weight should be slightly to the *right* (and it changes to more balanced as you get more refined) which is how your horse would be bent and is the lead you are asking for.
Anyway, in western reining, if I were asking for a right lead, my weight would be slightly to the *left* to give the inside leg room to drive under. Where is your weight "supposed" to be or does it really depend on the discipline?
When you answer, could you also discuss where the persons weight should be when leg yielding (as another example). I think the reining person told me if I am leg yielding to the right, using my left leg as an aid, my weight should be to the left (slightly). The dressage person told me my weight should be to the right in the same maneuver, because dressage people want their horses to move into, not away from, a person's weight. Also, if you don't mind one more question. When a horse is cantering on a circle, should the person's hips and shoulders be parallel to the horse's shoulders, or should just the person's hips be parallel, or is there a difference of opinion on this.
Thanks in advance.
Melanie
Hand: If you are going to canter, your inside rein tips the horse's nose just slightly to the inside; if you are asking for a lope, the same thing applies unless you are neck-reining, in which case your rein hand would move slightly to the left, to indicate that the horse should move (and bend) that way.
Leg: If you are asking for a canter depart, your outside leg comes back to ask the horse to strike off with that hind leg. The same thing applies when you ask for a lope -- your outside leg would come back to ask the horse to pick up the lope.
Think of the pattern of footfalls at the canter or lope -- the OUTSIDE hind leg is the strikeoff leg that initiates the first step into the new gait. The inside hind and outside foreleg touch down together, followed by the inside foreleg. That completes one stride, and the next one begins, again, with the outside hind leg.
In both forms of riding, you sit tall and straight, and SIGNAL the horse that you want a smooth transition to a canter or lope -- instead of leaning to one side and overbalancing him into a rough, staggering change of gait. In both forms of riding, your outside leg signals HIS outside hind leg that it should strike off -- it's the OUTSIDE hind leg that has to make the big effort of jumping into the canter while supporting the horse's weight; the inside leg SHARES the load with the outside foreleg.
If you are sitting straight and tall and balanced, with your horse bent slightly to the inside and your shoulders parallel to your horse's shoulders, shifting your outside leg back will automatically shift a little of your weight onto your INSIDE seatbone -- so, canter or lope, you're effectively using the same weight aid, and for the same reason.
Leg-yielding is a bit different, in that it's not really a movement in its own right, just a way to teach horses to move away from the rider's leg, and to go forward and sideways at the same time. Dressage training makes use of a horse's natural balance, movement, and instincts, and the horse's natural reaction to the rider's weight shifting sideways will be to move UNDER the weight so as to maintain his own balance. In the early stages of teaching the horse to move forward and sideways, the rider can combine the inside leg ASKING for the movement with the weight shifting slightly to the outside -- just to make the rider's wish VERY clear to the horse. Eventually, the horse learns to move in response to the leg aid alone.
Not all horses are taught to balance over their own legs, or to balance the rider! Horses that are just taught to change direction, but not taught to bend through turns, don't keep their legs under their own weight, but lean INTO their turns (like motorcycles!). If you stopped such a horse halfway through a sharp turn, he would fall to the inside.
Rider position does matter, very much. And yes, riders with good positions keep their shoulders and their hips parallel to their horse's shoulders and hips.
Hope this makes it all more understandable!
Jessica
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